Her Dark Rose
by Bhryn Astairre
Summary: The world had changed. The Migration Home had begun, countries coming together in peace but not all was perfect, not everyone sung in harmony to the song Aerith and Tifa strove to craft together. Last in Reborn Trilogy aka Love Not Often, Heart Less Love.


**:: Her Dark Rose ::**

_Tender is the touch of someone that you love too much  
Tender is the day the demons go away  
Blur_

**Prologue: Tender**

* * *

_Tonight I dreamed of you,  
__Somehow you dreamed of me too.  
__We met where flowers bloom  
__And pulled the world from it's doom._

_Tomorrow you said, comes too fast  
__A day I know cannot last;  
__And still I wish for it to be  
__I lay the plans, for her, for me._

_Tonight I slept on clouds  
__Rivers of stars in silvery sound;  
__I swear that when I wake  
__To put right all my mistakes._

_Tomorrow comes too soon  
__Tomorrow comes too soon..._

* * *

"I see," she put down the sheaf of papers, feeling a thousand years older in the space of ten minutes. Across her table, by the arched doorway stood her two guests, both unrepentant for the news they'd deftly landed atop the desk, adding grey hairs in moments that she knew she would be pulling out later in exasperation. "I had thought it might be something like this."

"It's not like I deceived you," the young woman huffed, folding her slim arms. She'd changed into one of the form fitting robes and soft slipped, sensibly soled for the rather rocky terrain about the city. "I just, I didn't know exactly what was going to happen."

"I tried to find you, but there was nothing. The Planet kept suspiciously silent as it did, in fact, for a long time afterwards. It was only when I saw Marlene that I felt something close to excitement, like a child hiding a surprise present from someone it loves."

"Marlene, so she is Reborn too?"

"Reborn, what a word... well I suppose Ancient won't fit now."

"No, you are the only Ancient left."

Aerith laughed, "am I truly so old to you all?"

"No, no, that's not what I meant!"

Aerith waved a delicate hand. She was seated in her office, the highest room available in the once abandoned City of the Ancients. The walls were shell long turned to crystal, the floor carpeted in lush, living moss that filled the entire room with a delicious fragrance. Her windows were transparent sections of the crystalline shell and her door an open archway. The few man-made items in her room of office were the mahogany desk, bookcases, fountain of water, some candles, pictures and of course, her phone. Otherwise, she seemed endlessly swamped by papers.

She, herself, had settled into the routine of being here smoothly, even going as far as to adopt the updated robes of the High Priestess. Same as the other robes that the Reborn were happily wearing, it was little more than a knee length, form hugging robe. However, underneath she wore a longer skirt, split into a multitude of ribbon-like tendrils of purple and soft blue, each end of ribbon stamped with the sigil of the High Priestess. She wore comfortable, flat soled knee boots in purple leather. The robe, instead of the tight arms, was sleeveless and she instead wore autonomous sleeves in a fetching criss-cross pattern down her arms, with several different buckles, should she need to peel back the billowing wrists for more elaborate work. The high neck of the robe came up under her chin and she had removed the ceremonial mask, made with ribbons, feathers and crystals. Gone was the childish pink she had always loved.

Like all things in this world, she had changed. "I'm the first one you've come to then, I suppose?"

"Yes, we weren't sure if we should but..."

"No, I'm glad," she smiled at them, "I think it might have caused collective apoplexy had you done it another way. I at least have an idea of how this came about."

This time, the young man shook his head with a rueful smile, "Oh boy, you just wish you knew the extent of it all. I just thought I'd tag along and give you some headaches."

"Thanks, awfully," she murmured drily, then was swept up into his arms, holding onto her so tightly that she was afraid she would burst into a shower of magic. A tiny part of her expected to pass through him, moving through beams of coloured light to fall on the floor. A small part of her mind said 'This is real, don't be so silly' but she couldn't help the wistful laughter bubbling out of her. "Oh I missed you!"

"Of course you did," he chuckled into her hair, "You still smell like flowers."

It was something unspoken between them but she could still feel it there; a warmth, filling her heart with a familiar glow. A happiness that only he could provide her with, a tenuous connection to a forgotten sanity, a life she could never escape but would never want to leave behind. She pulled away first, turning to the young woman and offering her arms. They were quickly around the thin shoulders, fingers stroking the shoulder length hair, still soft and fine and Aerith whispered words of encouragement to the woman.

"You are both home, now," she said, not letting go as the tears began to flow, sobs heaving into her shoulder, "You are here, where you should be."

"So, little Aerith managed to change the world. So much for those wishes being so tiny, eh?"

"Zack," she said fondly, lovingly, "Yuffie, don't ever leave again."

"Never," wept Yuffie, "Never!"

* * *

_Hookshot!_

He stretched the next rubber band between finger and thumb, aiming at the empty coffee mug by Tifa's elbow. She shot him a warning glance, the one that said 'it hits me and I break your spine'. Weighing his options carefully, given they were mid-meeting with the various heads of state for the proposed Universal Democratic Government. It was a bold move on the part of Tifa, Reeve and Barrett who had long considered their steps in a way to keep the changing world from collapsing in on itself. The idea was that each member country kept autonomy whilst answering to a greater ideal above them, to keep world peace and unity. It was, as they said, vital in case other disasters befell the Planet so countries could react accordingly to keep casualties to a minimum.

His chances were good, he decided, as Tifa turned her head to talk with Reeve. He flicked the band, and missed. It thwacked her on the left breast, much to his eternal horror, coupled with the long look she levelled at him. It promised death.

Cloud huffed and looked away, trying to act blasé and picked up his phone, thumbing through the message he'd been sent earlier. It was pretty self explanatory. Of course, he was totally unsure what any of the others would say. He had some idea that he'd been told first because he was less likely to flip out over it. If there was one good thing about time moving along the way it had done, it was that he had mellowed considerably from his youth.

Zack and Yuffie, both alive, part of the miracle that Aerith had performed at a greater personal cost to her own future, to Tifa's.

He put the phone down, looking over the room at the faces of the representatives for the various countries. Of course, this was also part of the problem they were facing right now. Aerith's miracle had involved bringing about the Migration Home, or rather, the surge of Reborn. It was a colloquial name for those humans who had some degree of propensity towards natural magic. The miracle had activated that string of DNA left useless in humanity, turning them effectively into new-era Cetra. After many exhaustive medical tests, it had been determined that Cetra, the Migration Home effect, had indeed been humans 'changed' somehow. It wasn't just existing people, newborns were arriving across the world. It was slow, at first, as it seemed. One in a hundred births was a Cetra.

Cloud looked at two people in particular in the crowd.

The first was Kennan Brett, a middle-aged man who had been a wealthy businessman in agricultural farming, wearing the form fitting knee-robe of a Reborn and tailored trousers and boots. The piping about the hood of the robe was blue, suggesting he had skill with 'supportive' abilities, though which was completely unclear, for Cloud didn't read Cetran, the hieroglyphs into which the blue was piped. About his neck hung a purple ribbon thin yoke, designating him as the City of Ancients representative, in fact, the representative for all Reborn. He was calm, well spoken and intelligent and seemed to genuinely enjoy calm debate.

The other was a woman in her late twenties with platinum hair pulled up from her face in a high-rising braid. She wore sunshades indoors, halfway down the bridge of her nose. She wore little make-up and had clad her sturdy frame in a suit of grey with black trim. Her hands, clasped calmly, had finely manicured nails and the fingers twitched every so often. This woman was Arabelle Victor, the head of the Purity movement. A movement, Cloud sniffed, that was adamant about human purity and deeply resented the integration of Reborn into society, viewing them as a social parasite, a genetic defect encouraged by the lesser minded.

It was going to be easy enough to make most countries agree to the policies put forward here, but the Purity and Reborn movements were at loggerheads almost every step of the way. It left them all squeezed between the two, feeling worn out at the end of a day.

"Hmph, this is going to be a moderately awful day," he sighed to himself as the meeting droned on. It was all the same talk, Purity didn't want to give ground, Reborn spoke of peace and acceptance, countries argued over rules and regulations and Tifa stood the sensible middle ground, trying to keep a tentative, wonky pact between them all and when it came down to it, making it clear that she wasn't above banishing them to separate corners of the room, so to speak.

A couple of mind-numbing hours later and they all decided to get some air and some food, he wasn't sure though which he was more glad of. Just as he was making the turn for the canteen, his arm was gripped in the tightest iron grip and his heart sank from his throat, where it had leaped to, down to the bottom of his spine.

"Strife, you are living up to your name," Tifa hissed in exasperation.

"You looked about as bored as I did," he shrugged.

"Bored or not, if you'd missed-"

"But I didn't."

"But you could have."

"But! I didn't." He grinned at her.

Tifa blew air out, letting him go and running her free hand through her hair, cut short to just below her ears, still pixie enough and with just enough layers that she could style it however she felt she needed to. Her eyes were worn though, still that unusual wine-red colour but somehow a little joyless. Her skin still alabaster and her face youthful and beautiful enough that many men found themselves blushing and stammering over words when talking to her. She was wearing a sleeveless crème turtle-neck shirt, with black trousers and kitten heels. Her other hand, the left one, held a sheaf of papers and folders, but not enough to hide the sparkle of the platinum band set with a single diamond.

"You know what, fine, but you said you needed to speak to me. Or at least your guilty looks at that phone you're trying to stuff into your trouser pocket told me that you were hiding something I need to know and probably wouldn't like."

"Ah, that." Cloud stopped trying to hide his phone, but kept his back away from Tifa. She still kept up her martial arts training, he wasn't stupid and Lockhart wasn't the grudge forgiving type. "Well, I got a mail from your... wife... lady... person." Boy, this was getting more awkward as time passed; didn't help that he didn't know how the hell to term them. Was there only one wife? If so, was Tifa the husband? She wore the trousers after all, literally. Or two wives? Or maybe no wife or husband? Or...? He shook his head, he was getting side tracked. "ANY-way, it pretty much said that it seems like the Migration Home wasn't the only thing that happened. Like before, it spat some people out."

"Spat some people out? What are you blathering about?" She looked wholly perplexed and angry now.

"Uh, I mean... the girl we thought was dead..." Cloud saw understanding register, then shock as he continued, "And a mutual friend of ours who liked wolves."

"I see," Tifa looked around, there weren't many people close by, but surely she could see why he was being so cagey. These kinds of matters had a habit of blowing up, especially with the Purity movement making so many ripples. "Does Vincent know?"

"No, I have a feeling it's up to me to find him and tell him."

"Do you know where he is?"

"Actually, yeah I do." Cloud grimaced, "I'm in for a long trip, I have to made a flight to Wutai."

"Wutai!" She repeated. "What in Gaia's name is he doing there?"

"Visiting, out of respect. And probably trying to drown his sorrows... of course most of that will seem pretty useless once I find him but, eh, "Cloud shrugged and sighed. He hadn't changed much either. He'd swapped his casual clothes for a smart black suit and blue shirt, and had his hair cut a little shorter, but still spiked up. He'd at least taken the earring it, it looked so ridiculous. "I guess I'd better get on it. You gonna be alright in there without me?"

This time she smiled, a flash of something beautiful, fierce with determination. "Of course, I promised Aerith I'd try and fix things from my end whilst she gets a grip on things up there. It's tough being apart, but, I know I owe it to her and to myself to make this right. No more backing out."

"Oh, it's like that huh?"

"Yes, it is. Be safe, Cloud and don't take too long. I feel like strangling Arabella half the time when you're here to deflate my temper." Tifa laughed and hauled the papers up, walking towards the canteen and leaving Cloud to watch her go.

"Or are you just trying to make up for not being able to give her kids, Teef?" He sighed, turning and walking in the opposing direction to the gates out of the courtyard. He had a long and difficult time ahead of him, he already knew that. Maybe he'd pick Cid up for the fun along the way, if that old pilot had nothing better to do than guzzle tea and moan about his rocket...

* * *

_Tomorrow comes too soon._


End file.
